A sliding pocket door with frosted glass would give you light and privacy.

It's not possible to let your folks use one of the existing bedrooms?

This is a little bit difficult without knowing what the living room layout is but...

I don't like the idea of the right side of the living room being cut off right in front of the kitchen door. To me, that creates an unnecessary obstacle, visually and physically. (also, have you thought about taking the kitchen/living room wall-door down and putting in an island?)

What if you put in a wall opposite the diagonal wall and created a triangular space in the corner? You could do pocket doors on either side, maybe a large bookcase on the living room side of the wall. Louvered glass along the top could be nice.

It would preserve most of the flow from the kitchen and give you a simple rectangular living room to play with.

I just want to ask the obvious question of - why can't they use one of the bedrooms?

Maybe they have children and that's why they can't use the second room as a guest room. Honestly, partitioning the living room from a guest room is uncomfortable for all involved, particularly if you anticipate your parents being here more often. When they come, give them your bedroom and you can sleep in the living room on an air mattress. Or you can sleep in the second bedroom. Frequent guests should be given the courtesy of privacy and a real guest bedroom.

I might put a long floor to ceiling bookcase/wallunit at the inward facing corner by the front door it could serve as storage for living room and the back side could be the wall of the bedroom. A rolling screen could form the short wall facing the bathroom wall?????

Instead of partioning something off that is permanent (and which would really make your living room much smaller whether they're there or not) why not build something multifunctional and mobile? Something like this mobile "feng shui loft cube" could be used as a bed at night but as a kind of home office during the day, or a play space for the kids (which you presumably have living in the second bedroom).

http://www.gizmag.com/feng-shui-mobile-loft-cube/23987/

Have you thought about making something less permanent? Like some decorative screens that you could use to partition a daybed off when you have guests? That way you don't have to permanently set anything up and mess up the flow of the room.

I'm not sure how big your budget is, but maybe converting the kitchen to a third bedroom is an option? You'll need to install a smaller, but functional kitchen in the living room. I would probably put the new kitchen on the diagonal wall, so you don't loose the functionality of the corner for your sofa etc? Hope this gives you some ideas.

If you are going to partition the room, don't do it on the right, do it at the top of your floorplan. That way, you have room to walk to and from the kitchen easily. Also, if the door to the room is on the short wall to the left, the room will get some light in from the patio or deck door when it is open. And I wouldn't do mirrors.

I would not partition this room, though, I think you are better off to put a sofabed or murphy bed in, and use a screen to create some privacy when you have guests. You aren't going to have real room privacy anyway with thin walls, louvers on top, etc. You can screen off a section of the room when you have guests, and enjoy the whole room when you don't. You can even use the couch if you get a sofabed. I think you get more use out of sofabeds for this reason than murphy beds, which tend to be more expensive than sofabeds, and used more rarely.

Not all sofabeds are uncomfortable to sleep on. Yes, the kind with metal bars and springs are. American Leather makes many (in fabric, too) with their comfort sleeper mechanism that are foam on board - feels like a regular firm mattress when open. My guests like sleeping on mine. Some independent furniture stores sell them, and they also marke a few for places like room and board, crate and barrel and desable thign within reach, and perhaps other stores, so you can go check them out and see how comfortable they are. They may cost more, but not more than putting up walls would. There are also many more modern sofabeds out there that are also solid foam, with no bars and springs at all, and which are more comfortable to sleep on, though not as comfortable, the ones I've seen, as the ones made by American Leather.

And, if you really want your parents to have their own room, you can give them yours - you'd be comfortable on the sofabed.

would it be possible to use the hallway adjoining the kitchen as a guest bedroom? you could sacrifice the wardrobe of bedroom 1 and create a new entryway for both the bedrooms. this would save the wasted space in the hallway - this new room would also automatically have a closet and bathroom attached. if this is too small, it can be extended as a L shaped room around the kitchen. i feel this will maintain the aesthetics of the place and save wasted area....

If there are children in the second bedroom, and since both bedrooms seem to have attached baths, why not make the smaller of the 2 the "master", and divide up the other larger bedroom with a partition of some sort. It could function as a play space, reading, studying area with a daybed until needed for guests.

I have a Murphy Bed in my studio and I love it. It's aesthetically nice when the bed is up and quite comfortable to sleep on. I'd go that route if you can.

If you reconfigure your hallway slightly it may make sense to divide off the smallest amount of space possible from bedroom 2 (toward the top of the drawing). They you would still have access to all three bedrooms from the hallway, not lose any living space, and have a proper private place. I think partitioning the living room successfully would be very tough. Good luck!

@runwithsissors- best suggestion yet! No wasted space, and much more private. I am impressed!

I agree with where these last few posts have been going. Give the kids (assuming there are some) bedroom 1, partition off the 'top' of bedroom 2 as the guest room, with a doorway out to the area in front of the washer/drier, and keep the rest of bedroom 2 as the master. Although I guess that would leave the new master with no window. Hmmm.

Unless you turn the master bath into a bedroom, I'm afraid the shape of that living room does not lend itself well to partitioning. If she must have a private space then I think its more feasible to give her the entire living room and perhaps build a temporary wall that separates the living room and creates a small hallway for the rest of the household to enter the kitchen. Once she has made her bed she can open up her room for the rest of the family to use. You could easily fit a bed *and* couch and TV in that space.

Could you divide bedroom 2 in half, with the upper "room" connecting to the hallway? It would probably mean taking some of the entryway into bedroom #1, and swapping the door to bedroom #1 for one closer to the actual room. All you'd lose is dead hallway space.

I would create a triangular division. I'd draw a line from the inner corner (where the toilet is) of the 1st bathroom to the outside wall. Make it parallel to the wall angling away from the kitchen. Bed along one wall, clothing storage and perhaps a small desk along the other with a wedge of floor space. If you want to make it permanent, then I'd make a wall with French doors that would have an opaque covering for nighttime.

I would have them stay in a hotel.

You need to find out what the building code in your area will allow. And I second the hotel idea.

I wouldn't do it at all.

My options:
-Invest in a high quality sofa bed. If anything, get a mattress topper you can hide somewhere for added comfort. If the parents still don't like it, give them your bed and you sleep on the sofa bed.

-With the assumption that bedroom #2 is for a child, put in a queen bed and when the parental units come to visit, the child either goes in your room on an air mattress or sleeps on the couch.

-Bunkbeds. The kind where the bottom bunk is queen sized. Child goes up top and PU's get the bottom.

-Murphy bed and Ikea panel curtains for privacy but even that's pretty extreme for what I'd be willing to do.

Bottom line, I wouldn't do anything that would effect my enjoyment/use of my new home or the potential resale value for visitors, even if they are parents.

Without a scale it's very hard to judge, but to me the least disruptive option would be to sacrifice the guest WC in the hallway and knock it into the adjacent cupboard, creating a small study/guestroom next to the front door. (If you really must have three toilets in the house you could put a smaller WC in the large coats closet opposite, although you'd need a pocket door.) Second option to that would be to use the entry area of bedroom 1, with the wardrobe space and a bite out of bedroom 2 to get the door back in. That's more walls though.

We bought my mom a LaZboy sofa bed for her frequent visits. We have a guest room, but the stairs are difficult for her, so she prefers to use our office--the studio sofa is a full size bed and is quite comfortable--no bar, and an aerobed mattress on top of the inner spring mattress--my mom (and our other visitors really love it). A sofa bed of that ilk with some privacy screens might be a better option than carving up your living space.

save money for a hotel room :)
I wouldn't do anything permanent, as others suggested, get a nice sofa bed or a Murphy bed for guests.

I'm afraid that with that layout, there is no way to squeeze a third bedroom out of the living room; it will destroy the function and flow of your home, and will not be a comfortable "room" to boot.

If you can't accommodate your parents in the second bedroom (is it an office? If so, there is probably something clever that can be done), and you insist in having them stay with you when they visit, then this is the wrong apartment for you and you should hold off on buying it. You will come to regret this purchase.

I don't believe in house-guests that live in our home over 5 days.

So, what we do is take our kids, who sleep anywhere and love it, and let them sleep on the sofa/air mattress- or on a fun bed made in the living room- just while our guests are there.

Our oldest girl has a queen bed, and she gives that up when guests come. She sleeps either on the spare bunk bed in her sister's room, or on the couch. Then the guest gets a bathroom and bedroom with a door- more privacy all around, and keeps everyone happy.

I wouldn't do anything permanent, for several reasons:
- If you chop up the living room it will look and feel awkward.
- It's not worth the hassle (and major expense) of shuffling bathrooms around - leave the plumbing where it is.
- I wouldn't omit any closets or bathrooms - you could possibly repurpose a closet, but leave it as is otherwise you kill your resale.
- I strongly advise against doing any partitioning that creates a third, windowless bedroom. Bedrooms without windows are unpleasant and, more than likely, against building/fire codes.

If you really want to explore this, hire an architect. (S)he can advise you how to do this safely.

However, I think you're better off with the sofa bed, hotel or giving them your bed. Lots of people get away without a guest room, and creating one would practically ruin your apartment.

Check out The Room Divider Store!

Moveable partition. Put a bookshelf on wheels so you can divide as you wish but honestly, they are your parents...give up your room.
If it's long stay, maybe a hotel room might be best for all involved.

I've slept on sofa's as an over night thing but anything longer, I would opt for the hotel. There is no privacy and you MUST get up when everyone else does. That's not a vacation I want to have.

You need to check with your local building codes before you do anything. This may drastically change what you have planned to do in terms of constructing anything.

1) Bookcases on wheels that spend most of the time against the walls of the living room, but can be moved out to create a small sleeping nook in the corner of the room, as necessary.

2) Resite the entrance to the bathroom for Bedroom 1 to the middle of the wall in Bedroom 1. Then close off the hall space and create a sleeping nook that includes the wardrobe. You'd have to add clothing storage in Bedroom 1, but there appears to be enough room for something like an Ikea Pax unit. As far as resale - making the sleeping nook into some kind of office space or storage space could make up for the loss of the wardrobe, if you build in something Pax-like in the room itself.

3) If you can at all afford it, hire an architect to advise you. This is the kind of thing they excel at.

4) I like the idea of moving the kitchen to one of the walls of the living room and converting the kitchen to a bedroom. If you can afford such a thing.

don't do it. You are destroying your living room space no matter how it's done. It's not worth it.

I agree with the idea to get a comfortable sleeper sofa (regardless of the solution you choose). Sofa beds have come a long way since we were kids. We bought a Room & Board air coil sleeper sofa and tried it ourselves - it feels just like a normal bed.

They've moved the support bar, so it's not right under your back. Then they topped a regular sleeper mattress with an air mattress and a nice mattress cover. If you add a pillow-top mattress cover, your sleeper sofa will be more comfortable than a lot of hotel beds. And they're a breeze to inflate & put away. (Pardon the pun.)

Obviously you have several options for potentially accommodating your parents. However I have to agree with the commenters who question why you are buying a two-bedroom apartment when it is apparent you actually need three bedrooms. If your parents are going to be visiting so frequently that you need to subdivide a room in your apartment, you need to reconsider your two-bedroom apartment purchase. Even without having room dimensions available, it is obvious from your floorplan that subdividing your living room, or one of the bedrooms to accommodate parental visits will destroy that room. It is also important to consider that living in cramped quarters for extended time periods could likely damage domestic harmony. Seriously consider a three-bedroom apartment and if affordability will be an issue, I would explain the situation to your parents and ask for assistance with the purchase.

Good Luck!

I agree with Pi. Seeing as the living-dining room is the only common gathering place, sectioning it off would not allow for privacy or quiet, unless you're thinking about building permanent walls. In that case, you might consider reworking the bedroom area from two rooms to three.

I am not like others on this list who keep pushing people to stay in hotels. Nothing is like having family in your home, sitting around in the mornings, eating breakfast in your jammies, relaxing and having fun. Having said that, holy moly, this is a challenge. Don't know your budget and don't know if the wall along the top is an outside wall, but if I had the budget and the outside wall, I'd seriously consider turning the kitchen into the guest room and moving the kitchen out to share the living room space, sort of a great room.

Your suggestion is great Donna, but in a condo/apartment, you can't just move the plumbing and electrical like that. It would be easier (and less expensive) to find a more suitable apartment.

Here in Manhattan, the land of no space and crazy prices, I know people who have done exactly what you are proposing. Essentially, they created a narrow room open to the living room with sliding or pocket glass doors that, when open, serves as a TV room, office or den. They have convertible sofas facing towards the entry way. I'd the room is longer than you need, maybe at a closet at the wall end?

I could see doing this along the north wall of the living room. By abutting the terrace, it will have light. The sliding doors and sofa mean it isn't a bedroom, which helps with building code issues - but you need to check - and you're not doing anything structural or involving plumbing. Decide if you want Sheetrock or, say, frosted glass walls. You can always put in transoms at the top of the walls for ventilation or some type of nice mesh /grill.

What's nice about this type of solution is that when you and the kids are in bed, your parents have full access to the kitchen and bath, giving them a studio of their own.

Resource Furniture is expensive but has great solutions. If you can't afford them, use them as inspiration. http://www.resourcefurniture.com/space-savers/queen-space-saving-beds

use bdr 1 as a master,divided bdr 2 with a wall use ,the part with the bathroom for your parents,open a door for the second half of bdr2 behind the door of the bdr1 ,and if you dont want the bedrooms to be open to eachother ,you can place the original door of the room back by the wall .or do what I do I keep extra full size trundle bed with ikea mattress under my bed ,when someone stays in for few days ,I just give him my daughter's room and make my daughter sleep with us ,it is fun for few days but remember you have to move all clothes and toys out to ur room.

I agree with SophieRose - sacrifice the powder room and the storeroom to form a little guest space next to the front door. Move the door to Bedroom 1 up so that its ensuite becomes accessible from the hall, making it into a family/guest bathroom. Use Bedroom 2 as your master bedroom.

Permanently partitioning off part of the living room is a titanically bad idea.

I agree with allisonharris, you don't want to do anything permanent, at the very least until you have at least tried having them visit without having entered into a construction phase (it may be easier for them to visit than you first thought, many of the features that we think we need become less important in a different space).
I would look at the studio apartment posts and look at the options used there to section off space. You may find that some panel curtains are just what you need. You can also think about how to incorporate a nice cupboard that acts as a suitcase rack and gives your guests some hanging space so the room could be re-opened while they are staying if desired.
Dare I say it, if you do your research you can find a really comfortable sofabed.

Not sure what codes in your area allow, but typically to be considered a bedroom, a window for egress is required. Many architects will work on an hourly basis, and I'd strongly suggest consulting with a residential architect to get an expert opinion and be sure if you do something permanent you are following local codes so you don't have any future issues when you sell the property. I like the temporary solutions that many people have suggested, since if you are concerned with resale in the future, I think your current floor plan would have greater resale value than creating smaller living space.

What about a nice trundle bed in the second bedroom that pops-up to create a real "king" size bed. It's good for kid sleepovers as well. Since its a real mattress, it will be comfortable, too.

I would get a garden shed and put it on wheels. That or a make a box and do the same, making it only a little larger than the bed. They're cheap, they could be temporary and taken apart of course. You could move it around or anchor it and play with it's position in the living room. And it could look cool and fun to have inside your house.

I'd move the doorway to bedroom two up, and turn the end of that hallway and the coat closet into a small bedroom. If it functions as a small study when not in use as a guest room you wouldn't lose access to the half bath.

I sympathize with finding the exact perfect location, but I too would most likely be searching for a new apartment. When it comes to moving the kitchen, I always thought what you said too, but in recent years I've heard of people being able to do exactly this sort of moving of items, but it was only agreed upon (in these two instances) when plumbing and electrical were on an outside wall. With the bathroom in bedroom #1 on that one wall, there is already plumbing in the general vicinity. For a kitchen the other issue would be venting for the range, which could be done on the outside wall . . . if it is an outside wall. If they had enough budget, they could take out the wall between the living room and the existing kitchen, put in a sliding door system and have a daybed and desk in this space. Slide open the "doors" and you have extra seating for the living room. Slide the doors closed and a teeny guest room.

http://gallery.apartmenttherapy.com/photo/anna-joe-house-tour/item/377461
http://gallery.apartmenttherapy.com/photo/anna-joe-house-tour/item/377480

Agreed... Hunt for a more suitable unit. Harsh but true.
As an Architect I've (embarassingly) designed/built hundreds if not thousands of Units. That one is simply poor work. I can't imagine the twit who drew it.
It has almost No windows, the rooms are oddly and imo ineptly situated/designed .
The kitchen is odd and even sealed off. The entry is cramped, yet the central hallway to nowhere is expansive by comparison. I could go on .. but it wouldn't make you happier.

I would make bedroom one the master,and then simply make a temporary space in bedroom two. Put the kids' bed in the top area, then have a curtain rail to cordon off that space. Then put a sofa bed in the bottom area nearest the door, and then either give visitors that space or give your parents your room.

Thanks - OP here. I read all your comments with interest and thought i'd update this thread with what little progress we have made so far - and it hasnt been much because of our indecision and lack of a single unambiguous option.

For context, i live in central London, so the closest approximation in the US would be Manhattan i suppose. Hence options like putting up parents in a hotel every time they visit / buying a 3 bedroom apartment (believe me - we really wanted to) are just plain unaffordable for the area we live in. Other options were to buy smaller / cheaper 2 bed flats, but i think we need the space this apartment offers, eg for storage.

We have moved into the apartment now. Bedroom 2 is our master, bedroom 1 is set up as the nursery, which should be occupied in a few weeks' time, all being well. I vetoed the partition idea - as many of you pointed out as well - since found it impractical without having another external window we could work into the floor plan. I did consider knockng the powder room and closet into a small study - but this would be very stuffy for the expense that would go into it. Still - an option that i can reconsider at a later stage.

We've put an extendable hemnes day bed from Ikea in the nursery for whoever wants to sleep there with the baby. I dont think i particularly want to give up my own room for parents or in laws, neither is that their expectation! We are probably going to get a wallbed fronted by a desk as shown here http://www.bonbon.co.uk/clei/ulisse_desk.htm#
and install it in the living room, and then think of some way to aesthetically work in some privacy eg screen dividers / curtains. This hasnt been a clearcut solution since our walls are plasterboard, and wallbeds need something more permanent to anchor to, but
I have now been told it should be workable.

The thought of damaging the walls, and more importantly - how safe this wallbed would be with a child around - still bothers me. So i was looking at a basic modular sofa http://www.maisonsdumonde.com/UK/en/produits/fiche/daybed-cancun-111210.htm
as an alternative, to place in the top right corner of the living room - which is where the wallbed would go in any case. I really couldnt find other options that were easily available in London which would serve our purpose without completely destroying the aesthetics of the living room.

So that's the way we're going. But may change direction and convert the powder room and closet to a tiny broom cupboard of a study / room if that makes more sense.